The John Milton Series Box Set 4

by Mark Dawson

  Milton went around to the back of the car and took out his rucksack. He hoisted it onto his shoulders, tightened the straps until they were comfortable, locked the car and started to walk.

  It took him over an hour to find the property. It was located to the southwest of the town, beyond the signs that directed visitors to the Poggio Grande vineyard. The house was accessed by a dirt track that branched off the picturesque Strada di Ripa D’Orcia, a hand-painted sign identifying it as Casa Tulipano. The flowers that gave the property its name were much in evidence, with the bank to the right of the track showing a multicoloured display and infusing the hot air with their heady scent.

  There was a mailbox next to the sign. Milton opened it, hoping to find something that might suggest that the Russos were in or about to be in residence, but it was empty.

  The terrain here was steep, with a series of small hills rolling into more impressive climbs. Two stands of majestic cypresses had been planted on either side of the track, and a copse of fir and ash could be seen on the slopes of the hills to the north and south. The track wound between these hills, headed due west.

  Milton’s map suggested that the farmhouse was another two miles in that direction. He turned off the road and climbed up the bank, continuing to the north and then following the route of the track from inside the tree line. He traversed carefully, on high alert, stopping regularly to scan the terrain ahead and behind. A tractor chugged through the fields of the vineyard to the south but, save that, there was no sign of anyone in the vicinity.

  Milton proceeded with care.

  Milton crested a sloping hill, and the farmhouse presented itself. It sat atop a shallow plateau at the bottom of a depression, the terrain sloping up around it on all sides. It was a large building, the end facing him clad entirely in a cloak of thick ivy that was punctuated only by windows. The track switched back on itself as it climbed to the plateau, terminating in a wide parking area. He saw the crystal blue of a swimming pool from within a screen of trees, a summerhouse and a collection of outbuildings that must have served the vineyard. Those cultivated fields stretched around the property, with the largest acreage laid out between a large barn and the start of the foothills perhaps a mile to the west. It was an impressive estate. Milton was not an expert on Italian real estate, but the similar properties that he had researched online had price tags of anywhere up to three million euros.

  Milton put the binoculars to his eyes and scanned the estate. He started with the distant fields and then continued until he was looking at the property itself. There was no sign that anyone was in attendance. The fields were in good order, with the vines laid out in neat rows, clearly given the attention necessary for them to continue to be farmed. The lawns around the property looked to have been cut within the last few days. They sported back-and-forth stripes and were a verdant green—noticeable given the parched yellows and browns of the scrub—signalling the ministrations of a diligent gardener. There were no cars beneath the porte cochère, nor on the gravel turning circle that had been laid out in front of the house.

  Milton scrutinised the area closer to his present position. There was a copse behind him, slightly up the slope, and Milton climbed up to it. He pushed his way through the bracken that had gathered between the trunks of the hornbeams and linden and then turned back to consider the scope of the view. It was promising. There was a narrow clearing inside the tree line where he would be able to erect his tent so that it wasn’t visible from the house, and, with a little judicious clearing of the underbrush, he would have reasonable sightlines into the valley. He would be able to see the track until it disappeared over the ridge, two aspects of the house, the turning area and the pool, and much of the vineyard. He was satisfied.

  He took off his pack and dumped it against the nearest trunk. He would put the tent up later; for now, he wanted to take the opportunity to scout the property while it was unattended.

  He picked a route that would offer frequent cover and started down the slope.

  78

  Milton proceeded carefully, staying low and hurrying through the stretches where he could not quickly retreat to cover. He was aware that it might not just be the Russos who were on their way to the house, although they had shown themselves to be more than dangerous enough to earn his caution; there was also the chance—the hope—that whoever had murdered Beau was also on their way.

  He passed through a grove of olive trees that showed signs of cultivation, and then through the formal gardens that were marked by a row of tall Tuscan cypresses, matched to the double line that followed the track leading back to the road. Milton reached the first of a series of outbuildings and pressed himself against the wall, grateful for the shade. He peered around the corner and still could not see any sign of activity from within the property or in the grounds that surrounded it. He was as satisfied as he could be that he was safe to continue.

  He turned around the corner and moved ahead, hurrying by an ornamental garden until the hard earth was replaced by the gravel of the drive. He went around the house, moving to the rear so that his presence would be masked should anyone approach.

  The windows at the back of the house were covered by shutters that had been closed and secured from the inside. Milton was unable to see through them to the interior, so he continued along the wall until he got to a wide pair of French doors. He tried the handles, but the doors were locked. They weren’t shuttered, though, and by cupping his hand to the glass, he was able to cut out the glare from the sun and look inside. It was some sort of anteroom, with a tiled floor and an ornate archway that opened onto a corridor that went deeper into the house.

  He heard the sound of an engine.

  He froze, closed his eyes and listened: it was approaching from the other side of the house, most likely from the track. He heard the squeak of the vehicle’s suspension and then the crunch as it passed from the rough surface to the gravel. He opened his eyes and assessed his options. He wouldn’t be able to get back to the copse where he had left his tent without being seen from the front of the house. The vineyard was close at hand, but he dared not go there in the event that whoever had just arrived was responsible for tending to the grapes. The same went for the brick shed that faced it; he guessed that the equipment was stored there.

  He moved around the house, turning the corner and looking down on the glittering azure rectangle of the pool. There was a pool house next to it. It would have to do. He crossed the lawn until he reached the building and slipped into the shade behind it.

  He stopped, closed his eyes again, and listened.

  The engine switched off and he heard the sound of voices drifting down to him on the breeze. They were too far away for him to be able to pick out the words, but he could tell that there was more than one speaker. He thought he could distinguish three speakers: two male and one female. He heard laughter.

  It had to be the Russos.

  He shuffled around to the door that led into the pool house and tried the handle. It was unlocked. He opened it and slipped inside. The interior was messy: to Milton’s left were an oil-fired boiler and the hydraulics for the pool cover; the wall to his right had been fitted with shelves that held the chemicals and cleaning equipment used to maintain the water quality. There was a window on the other side of the boiler that faced the house, and Milton picked his way cautiously across the floor until he was alongside it. He peered out: the window faced one of the large shuttered windows on the ground floor of the farmhouse and, as Milton watched, the shutters were opened and the interior revealed.

  It was the kitchen. Jessica Russo was looking out of the window, her head angled so that she could look down the slope to the pool. She was speaking to someone else and, as Milton waited, holding his breath, he saw Mason Russo and then Richard Russo.

  Milton retreated from the window and crossed back to the door. He knew that now would be a good time to take action against them. They had no idea that he was here, and subduing them—even withou
t a weapon—would be a simple enough thing to do. He would take them out in the order of the threat that they presented: Mason, Jessica, their father. He would secure them and then call Salazar. The family must have been charged with an extraditable offence after what had happened in Nevada—murder and theft, for a start—and the Carabinieri would be obliged to hold them in custody until the application to repatriate them had been heard. Milton had given that course of action serious thought on the flight from San Diego. There would be no consequences for him: the Russos could allege that he was involved, of course, but in the deaths of Beau and Sacca, there was no independent third party to support the claim. Of course, that was all moot given that Milton could just as easily disappear once he had left them for the Italians to find. It would be an easy thing to accomplish, and it would be the safest course of action, at least when it came to the family’s continued well-being.

  But Milton had dismissed the idea then, and he did so again now.

  He wanted them to face justice, and they would.

  But, more than that, he wanted justice for Beau, and that meant he needed to wait to see whether the sicario who had killed for the cartel smelled the bait and took it.

  Milton opened the door, stepped out into the heat of the afternoon, and closed it behind him. He couldn’t retrace his steps without risking discovery, so, relying on his reconnaissance from earlier, he descended the slope into the vineyard and started on a longer, more circuitous route that would bring him back to his observation point while minimising the risk that he might be seen.

  He settled into a steady jog, the sweat gathering on his forehead and running down onto his brow. He wanted to take up position. He felt it in his gut: the sicario was coming, and, when he did, Milton was going to show him the error of his ways.

  79

  Milton returned to the copse and took up position beneath the branches of the carrubo and myrtle that thronged the spaces between the trunks of the trees. He decided that there was no need to put up his tent. He was sheltered beneath the thick canopy overhead, and, in any event, the forecast for the next three days was for warm and dry weather. He laid out his sleeping bag, using that to soften the ground. He suspected that he was going to be prone for several hours, and the last thing he needed was to punish his body while he waited.

  He took out the binoculars and peered through them at the activity at the farmhouse below. The shutters on the ground floor had all been opened, and, as he settled down, the windows on the first and second floors were opened, too. He saw flickers of movement in the windows that faced his position, and, for a moment, he caught a glimpse of Jessica as she pulled back a set of shutters and then stood there, gazing out over the estate. Milton was adjusting the focus when she turned and disappeared again.

  He scoped the rest of the estate instead. The Russos had travelled to the house in a rental car, a dusty Audi A5 that was now parked beneath the porte cochère. He scanned farther out, looking for any sign that they might have been followed, or that anyone else was watching the house, but he saw nothing.

  He had time to prepare, so he took out the packet of zip ties that he had purchased from the camping equipment store. He removed two of them, made one into a loop that was big enough to slide around a large hand, and then threaded the second through the first before looping that one, too. It was a decent homemade restraint, and the best he would be able to do on short notice. He made more of them and put them into his pocket.

  Milton had been watching for fifteen minutes when Richard Russo stepped out of the open front door and, seemingly without a care in the world, crossed the turning circle to one of the barns. He unlocked a padlock and went inside. Milton was a decent distance away, but, even so, he heard the throaty rumble of a powerful engine and watched as a red Ferrari 348 Spider was driven out.

  Mason Russo came out of the door and watched his father as he parked the car, opened the door and got out, grinning broadly. Father and son enjoyed a conversation that was evidently amusing, given the faint laughter that floated up to where Milton was hunkered down. Milton focused on the younger of the two men and gritted his teeth; Richard was smart and Jessica was cunning, but it was the hollowness that he had observed in Mason that Milton found the most perturbing. He had taken out Delgado and his men without pity or feeling, and had only been persuaded against killing Milton and Beau by his sister’s entreaties. And, despite them, he had coldly put a bullet into an old man’s gut. There was a nihilism about him that he recognised in himself.

  He took out his phone and dialled the number for Louis Salazar.

  “Hello?”

  “Salazar—it’s me.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Italy. They’re here.”

  “Shit. They’re gonna wish they went somewhere else. I’ve made some progress.”

  Milton shifted position. “Go on.”

  “Richard Russo has been charged with fraud. That was a slam dunk—they’ve been sitting on that for a month. The kids are a little more difficult. The witnesses to what happened in the desert are dead.”

  “All except one,” Milton said.

  “Uh-huh. It’d be easier if you were prepared to give evidence.”

  “I’d much rather not.”

  “I thought you’d say that. It might not be necessary. We’ve checked Beau’s rental. We’ve got prints that we’ve matched to Mason Russo on the wheel. We don’t have prints for Jessica or their dad, but I’m betting we’ll be able to match them once we’ve got them back here.”

  “My prints will be in there, too.”

  “Are they on file anywhere?”

  “A couple of places,” Milton said. “I was arrested in Texas a couple of years ago. And Michigan after that.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “I’d appreciate that.”

  “We know that Beau rented that car, and we’ve got Jessica inside it—that backs up the story you two cooked up about Beau being jacked. We got the three of them on the passenger manifest of an Air Canada flight out of Vancouver to Montreal. We worked back from that and got video of them going across the border at Blaine. We got enough to charge them with attempted murder to go with the fraud. It’ll be enough to apply to have them extradited.”

  “Have you started that?”

  “I was told we spoke to the DOJ last night. They’ll speak to Interpol and put out a Red Notice. The locals will go and pick them up. What are you thinking?”

  Milton saw motion down below. Jessica had come out of the front door. She went to her father, and the two of them had a conversation.

  “The department will tell the Italians about Russo’s house, right?”

  “It’s an obvious line of enquiry. Why?”

  “I want to dangle them as bait for as long as I can,” Milton said. “Whoever killed Beau knows about the house, too.”

  “That’s an assumption.”

  “I don’t think so,” Milton retorted. “He’s coming.”

  “And what then?”

  “I’ll call you. You can send the Italians to get the Russos. You can leave the rest to me.”

  Jessica took something from her father and made her way to the Ferrari. Salazar was saying something, but Milton told him he would be in touch and killed the call. He brought the binoculars up to his eyes and watched as Jessica opened the door and lowered herself into the front seat of the Spider. He heard the rumble of the engine and then a roar as Jessica revved it, once and then twice. Another broad smile broke out on her father’s face as he watched. The Ferrari pulled out, crunching over the gravel and then proceeding carefully onto the rough track that led to the road.

  Milton watched the car climb up to the ridge and then disappear down the other side.

  80

  Milton stayed at his observation point all afternoon and into the gloom of dusk. Mason Russo went down to the pool and swam laps for half an hour while his father took a book out to a summerhouse near the vineyard and read. Milton could see both o
f them. He swept the rest of the terrain without seeing anyone else, save for a farmer who passed along a nearby field on a tractor. Both Richard and his son eventually went inside, reappearing out of the kitchen doors a short while later with drinks and lit cigars. Milton could see the glowing tips as the daylight slowly faded into the gloom of night.

  It was nine when Milton saw the rake of a car’s headlights arrowing into the sky above the ridge as the approaching vehicle neared the crest. Milton listened, heard the sound of a powerful engine and then saw the Ferrari as it reached the top and then continued down the track to the house. He watched, waiting to see whether Jessica had returned alone. It appeared that she had; there was no sign of anyone else.

  She reached the turning circle and parked near the house. Mason came out of the front door and intercepted her as she got out. He had changed his clothes since Milton had seen him with the cigar, and now, instead of his swimming shorts, he was wearing a leather jacket and jeans. He spoke with Jessica, pointed at the Ferrari, and took the keys. They were too far away for Milton to be able to hear their conversation, but the sentiments were clear: Mason was going out, he wanted to take the Spider and, Milton guessed, he was irritated that Jessica had taken so long to bring it back.

  The conversation ended and Jessica went inside. Mason opened the door to the car, started the engine and pulled out, giving the car a little more juice than Jessica had done, and sending it racing over the gravel and onto the track. Milton followed the car with the binoculars. He assumed that Mason was going somewhere he might get a drink and enjoy some company, perhaps to San Quirico d’Orcia.

  The car raced around the corner and started up the slope toward the ridge. Milton was about to turn the binoculars back to the house again when the brake lights glowed a sudden, urgent red and the car swerved over to the side of the road and crashed into one of the cypress trees. Milton froze, focused the binoculars and watched. The car was out of sight of the main house now, screened off by the trees but visible to Milton from his elevated position.